Iron Warriors Obliterators
I’ve been a little burnt out from blogging for awhile, though in the interim I’ve still been painting (if not playing – winter sucks!) Rather than go into the uninteresting trials and tribulations of my life, I’ll just get on with it and see how it goes. These models were finished last month, and so are part of my pledge for August’s entry of the Paint Challenge I’m involved with on Dakka.
I know these models are ugly as shit, but in my defence, I purchased them a long time ago, around when they were released, and they were at least a step up from the initial offerings. I attempted to.. well, not “fix” them (because just look at them) but make them look a little less terrible and fit in with my Iron Warriors who I had started at that time. I did so by turfing their original heads and replacing them with ones from the plastic Chaos Knights kit. I also felt that their “weapon hand” loadouts were on the wrong side of ridiculous, and so moved some stuff around, and added in a few plastic bits. They still look terrible, but hopefully less terrible than the stock models?
The colour scheme is the original one I came up with all those years ago. I felt that “mutated meat” looked far better than the pinky flesh that GW’s official scheme came up with, particularly against the metal and hazard-striped look of the IW scheme. In what was pretty much my first use of guitar strings, I added a couple of extra cables in places on the models, very sparingly.
In the recent “renovation” of these two, I’ve gone over some of the metals and re-weathered them in spots, rebased them on the new GW plastic bases to go alongside my other Iron Warriors (and added a bit of guitar string there). After the new layer of varnish, I also went over all of the flesh by highlighting in spots with regular red paint and then with both Blood for the Blood God and Spirit Stone Red in different “patches” of the flesh, which gives it a glistening viscera look – but with some variation and unevenness to it. This stand out in person more than in photos, but you can see it best in the left arm and hand of the Obliterator above.
I believe that I have one more of these guys in metal, but I’m damned if I can find him. I know I only painted the pair at the time since one of the initial targets for my IW was for a small “Kill Team”-style army of about 600 or 800 points, and I only planned to use two Oblits in that force. I did recently find another six (!) of them in finecast which I had picked up cheap on eBay a few years ago with a thought of being able to do more with them than the metal ones. So… that might become a thing? I’ve got some other things way before them in the queue right now, but I guess I should consider painting them before GW releases a new version that causes me to lose all interest in the ones I have…
A Family Photo….
The last pic just works to show them alongside their uninfected brethren. Their armour shows a lot more corrosion, discolouration and muck than the regular Iron Warriors. I’d say that the Obliterators are much less interested or able to properly maintain their armour. Especially as it’s now fused to them.
Hm.. I wonder if Gal Vorbak models would work well as Obliterators or Mutilators? They always struck me as the most awesome Possessed models, but maybe there’s something to be had there?
Azazel's Bitz Box. 
Why do you say ugly? I think they’re pretty cool. The painting has really brought them to life. Well done man.
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Thanks! But just compare these guys to these guys. Not a million miles away from each other conceptually, but the execution is miles apart.
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Welcome back Az, good to hear from you mate, I hope all is well. Yeah, the Oblits are a funny model… the GV get the ‘armour fusing mutation’ thing across much more effectively, but the Oblits really do have that bulking menace vibe going for them… It’s a tough one to call mate, but regardless, you’ve certainly elevated the Marmite stock models to something much better. The head swaps are spot on, and I like the way that you dealt with the flesh. Tidy job dude!
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Thanks Alex. I think swapping out the “John Carpenter’s The Thing” heads is one of the easier starts to making them look better than the stock models. I’ll have to do a side by side with some GV at some stage and work out whether to use them as Mutilators. I think with the figures already bought I’m pretty much stuck with the original models for the Obliterators!
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Outstanding work, man. Very cool alterations and a thrilling paint scheme 🙂
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Thanks mate, at least I was able to get enough of an IW scheme to come through, and the red certainly pops against the Iron.
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It does, there’s some great contrast in there between the red and the armour. They look pretty damn fearsome
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Not ugly at al!, The way you rendered mutated meat works super well with the metal armour. Old obliterators were not pleasing models, that’s agreed, but I kinda like that Cronenberg’s “new flesh” attempt better than the newer, slicker approach.
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Thanks Carlo. I think what annoys me about them is the execution rather than the concept. They sculpted some reasonable models and then just lazily adding the stretched meat bits went over the top with greenstuff rather than integrating that into the model, as they do with newer sculpts.
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Yes, you’re absolutely right.
And I just remembered how much I hated them in-game 🙂 – I used to play close combat only tyranids back in 5th edition.
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Great job on those. As almost everyone out there, I hate GW models for Obliterators (personally, I got an HiTech one for my Kill Team) but you managed to make them look more than ok. Good color choice and great weathering.
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Thank you Gabbi! I’ve seen the HiTech models before. I considered getting their Not-Mutilators at one point, as they’re certainly better than the GW ones – which make even the Obliterators look passable – but the HiTech have the overall same issue that I have with the official models in the way the mutated flesh is handled. I do like HiTech’s stuff in general, though. I’ve got a few about that I need to paint one day. I particularly like their Not-AdMech.
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I don’t think they are that bad in terms of sculpting and as always your paint job really makes them pop. That industrial theme you have goign combined with meaty muscle strings is quite the combination!
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Thanks, they do at least fit in well with the Iron Warriors.
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